New Intenational Schedule

         As many of you may have noticed this time the the qualifying for the Euro's has changed.  This year the dates for the double headed qualifying matches have been moved to Friday and Tuesday instead of the usual Saturday and Wednesday schedule.  I understand the main reason behind this, it looks to me like club pressure has forced the international schedule to accommodate there players more time to get back home and over jet lag or just have another days rest. 

        Over a season these extra days off could be the difference between having to concentrate on one competition or being able to fight effectively on multiple fronts.  Most people would of seen over previous seasons the decline of sides like Aston Villa, Everton or Fulham as the season goes on, because when they are still in European competitions they play anywhere between 5 and 15 extra games a season and due to their lack of squad depth they eventually fade on all fronts. 
        These few extra days rest every international break will add over a season and will help the clubs in the middle of all European leagues.  I truly believe that the all European leagues this year will all have fierce competitions for the last few European spots, I think that we might see a few surprising faces in European football next season.
        All though on the whole this is a good move I still see a side to this which is most unfortunate.  The side I speak of is the fact that all these international matches are now evening matches after work days.  That means that there are now people who can no longer attend international matches, when they were Saturday games with kick-offs anywhere between 12 and 6 there was chance for people far away from their national stadiums to come and watch the match.  Also families can no longer go on days out to international matches and it will decrease the number of children going to watch these matches and as we all know the children are the future of this sport. With these new times many people can't attend these matches and lower attendances will affect the smaller countries but hopefully not to too significant level. 
      But looking at the big picture I can only think that this is a good step forward UEFA lets hope that this sort of common sense continues in there policy making.